The Ship Model Forum

Hello:

After lurking here for a while, I figured it's about time to start posting pictures of the project I'm working on: the 1/200 USS Missouri kit built as she was in 1944. I find her earlier Ms 32 paint job is much more interesting than her later Ms 21 scheme, although it does make masking around all of the PE much more difficult. Back dating the kit involves fixing a few small things, and getting Kingfishers from somewhere. I've been using the Pontos PE set, but not the wood deck, since her deck was painted and you wouldn't see the wood.

Speaking of PE, that's where I started, to get a feel for the Pontos set. The set is excellent, with wonderful fit. There are some cases where the instructions are a bit vague. I started with the catapults, the crane, and the secondary gun directors.

I started this kit over 2 years ago. Happily, I am now perhaps half way done. To say that my build pace is glacial is a disservice to the rapid pace of glaciers. I'll start taking more pictures soon, but here is what I have for now.

Cheers
Mike

Looks like a good, clean start to the directors and catapults. Looking forward to more.

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Brett Matthews

Hello:

Here are a few more pictures to illustrate progress on the Missouri.

It was particularly difficult to pin down the paint scheme on the 5" gun turrets, as I was unable to find photos of some sides for several of the turrets. In those cases, I made a guess. The tops of the 5" turrets are mostly deck blue, but a few are ocean gray, and one looks to be black in the photos so I painted that one accordingly. The radius of the elevation trunion for the 5" guns is far too small. I bent a small piece of sheet metal, and drilled 2 holes in it for the guns to poke through, to simulate the right curvature. I made a jig to get the 2 brass gun barrels in the correct alignment.

For the 40 mm guns, I also made a jig to align the guns. Otherwise, the went together per the instructions. Fiddly and tedious. 12 down, 8 to go. I've also made perhaps a dozen or so of the 20 mm guns.

Finally, the aft funnel with a coat of paint. One reoccurring theme is that I'll glue on most of the PE (but leave off the ladders), paint, then glue on the ladders, and finally paint the ladders. The ladders and individual grab handles/steps prevent a good tape line, so I paint before these protrusions go on. It take a fair bit of planning to decide what should be on and off before painting. This is only an issue when a ladder cross the border between two colors. If a color border isn't crossed, then no problem to glue them on with the rest of the PE.

Cheers
Mike

Very nicely done!

_________________
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Very nice build - these things DO take time, don't they???

Hank

_________________
HMS III
Mocksville, NC
BB62 vet 68-69

Builder's yard:
USS STODDARD (DD-566) 66-68 1:144, Various Lg Scale FC Directors
Finished:
USS NEW JERSEY (BB-62) 67-69 1:200
USN Sloop/Ship PEACOCK (1813) 1:48
ROYAL CAROLINE (1748) 1:47
AVS (1768) 1:48

Hello:

Yes, these things do take a while. There's a decent chance I could be done by know if I didn't have:

A) 3 other kits in progress
B) to go to work
C) other hobbies (building telescopes ain't quick either)
D) life happening

I kind of admire folks who can whip together a Bf-109 in a weekend and have it end up looking good. I gave that a try, with a 1/48 Spitfire...still not done yet.

Cheers
Mike

Ha, the weekend part building a "quick" model. Tried that a few times just to take a break from my New Jersey.....doesn't work for me either!

Great work on the Missouri, some super clean work and painting you're doing.

_________________
Brett Matthews

Hello:

I hauled the Missouri out to remind myself of where I was when I put it on the shelf of doom. Here's what it looks like with all of the parts stacked up. I kind of forgot how big this thing is. For scale, on the left are 1/350 models of Enterprise and Texas.

Mike

The sheer time and materials involved often cause models to be not completed or have great hiatuses in construction. Commonly a model takes longer to construct than the real ship! I have a 1:192 scratch model of Alaska that I have been puttering on for 25 years. It went through several iterations of upgrade after I got into 3D printing. Really all it lacks at present is some rigging and a water base as it's. waterline model.

So I hope that you get back to this project, it will be a worthy accomplishment!

Best regards: Tom

Hello:

Ok, some real progress has actually happened! For me, it's kind of a big deal, since it's my first foray into 3D printing. RandyM sent me the CAD files, and I printed them on a 3D printer that we have at work. Each hull segment took about 1.5 days, but you just hit the 'go' button and walk away and come back a few days later and viola! Hull parts are magically there. I'd say that these parts are definitely useable, and I'm impressed that it came out so well on my first try.

There will be a fair amount of clean up to do, sanding to get the sides smooth, and of course hacking off the back end of the ship and gluing on a new butt. The sides are a bit flexible...perhaps a bit more so than the kit plastic but it far from flimsy. I think I might add some structures on the inside to increase the stiffness. But that's all in the future. First, I need to get the print supports cut off, and start thinking about how I want to tackle this.

Mike